Poison
by Cheeseburger of Doom
Summary: I hear voices in my head, telling me to kill, kill, kill.


A/N: another fic written for Moffit's squick fic contest...beware of blood, guts, death, etc.  
  
**Poison  
  
**I offer him the cup.

I am not sure what is going on behind those thick glasses of his. I am sure that no one ever knows what goes on behind those glasses of his.

He takes the cup.

He does not drink from it.

Does he know? How could he? I was careful; no one saw me.

I have never told anyone about the voices in my head -- except for that one boy, a couple of years ago. That was a mistake -- once he found out, he wanted to tell other people.

They found his body in a ditch a few nights later.

Kill, the voices say, sometimes.

"Thank you, Echizen," he says, "But I have my own water. Why don't you give it to Momo?"

It's not easy to keep a straight face, but I've had a lot of practice. I can't allow anyone to find out about me. I can't let anyone know.

I give him my best grumpy look. I don't want to give the water to Momo-sempai.

"Momo, would you like some water?"

"Are you sure that's water?" Momo-sempai asks, eyeing it suspiciously.

"Echizen brought it over."

"As long as you didn't bring it from home." Momo-sempai takes the cup, and drains it.

Stupid Momo-sempai.

That wasn't water.

Inui-sempai is looking at me again. I wonder what his expression is? He can't know what was in that cup, he can't.

"I have a headache," Momo-sempai announces. "I want to go home."

"Practice isn't over yet, Momo-sempai."

"I know, but I really feel like crap all of a sudden." Momo-sempai's face is very pale.

I feel sick.

"You shouldn't have eaten so much lunch," I say. I have to act natural. I can't let him know that this is my fault.

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

Yes, Momo-sempai is sick. He didn't even try to argue with me.

"Momo? Hey, are you all right?" Kikumaru-sempai asks. He leans over Momo-sempai, a curious look in his face.

"No," Momo-sempai replies, "I'm not all right." He coughs.

The cough brings up blood. He stares at his bloody hands with shock on his face.

"I guess I am sick --" and then he is struck by a coughing fit. He coughs, and coughs, and he can't stop.

Ryuzaki-sensei calls an ambulance. By the time it arrives, Momo-sempai is unconscious.

By the time he gets to the hospital, Momo-sempai will be dead.

"I'm sorry, he didn't make it," the nurse says, with clear pity on her face.

Inui-sempai is looking at me again. Does he know? How could he know?

Everyone is crying.

So am I.

I'm a good actor, after all.

"I miss Momo," Kikumaru-sempai laments.

"We all do," says Oishi-sempai.

Practice has been dreary for the past few days. I try to act as if I'm upset. I knew it was coming, but I'm not really upset.

Kill, the voices say sometimes. I have to listen to them, or they'd get louder, and louder, and my head would burst.

I don't want to die.

Kill.

Inui-sempai is offering me a cup.

I take the cup, but I do not drink.

"I'm not thirsty," I say.

"The latest version of Inui juice. It's good for you," he says. I peer into the cup -- and I do not drink from it.

He can't possibly know -- but I don't trust him, anyway.

"I won't," I say.

He takes the cup away from me, and he passes it on to Kikumaru-sempai, who is forced to drink it.

Inui-sempai knows.

His poison is much better than mine. It has much more drastic effects. Kikumaru-sempai just vomited blood, and he's curled up into a ball, crying. Oishi-sempai is trying to comfort him.

Kikumaru-sempai throws up again, and now Oishi-sempai is covered in Kikumaru-sempai's blood. Kikumaru-sempai starts to scream.

"Oishi, I feel like I'm coming apart --"

Kikumaru-sempai vomits once more. There is more than blood in his vomit.

I wonder what kind of poison could cause someone to bring up something that belongs on the inside?

I don't know what it is, but Kikumaru-sempai won't be able to live without it. He stares at it in horror for a few seconds, and then he collapses.

"Eiji! Eiji, hang in there!"

Ryuzaki-sensei has already called the ambulance, but it arrives only after Kikumaru-sempai is dead. Inui-sempai's poison is faster than mine was.

How does he know, though? How does he know my true self?

The next one to die will be Kawamura-sempai, if I can't kill Inui first.

Kill, the voices say.

Inui-sempai is watching me. How can I poison him while he watches? I try to slip something into his food, but he sees; he sees what I am doing.

He feeds his lunch to Kawamura-sempai. Kawamura-sempai looks surprised, but he does not refuse, because Inui-sempai insists.

Inui-sempai watches me as I watch him.

Kawamura-sempai just said that he's not feeling well. His lunch must not be agreeing with him -- which isn't surprising.

Kawamura-sempai does not vomit up any blood. He seems fine, apart from some nausea; he goes home early, to sleep it off.

The next day, Kawamura-sempai is not at school. The tennis club decides to go and visit him after practice.

I do not want to go, but what can I say?

"He hasn't come out of his room," says Kawamura's father. He seems worried. "He rarely gets sick. It must be a bug."

"Taka-san! It's us, can we come in?" Fuji-sempai says, as he knocks on the door to Kawamura-sempai's bedroom.

There is no reply.

Fuji-sempai pushes the door open, and steps in.

"Taka-san? What --" Fuji-sempai makes a strange sound that is almost like a gasp. It is easy to see why.

Kawamura-sempai is nothing but a skeleton. His skin has fallen off; more like melted, really. Its remains are on the floor.

I didn't know the poison would have that effect.

Kill, the voices say.

I did, why aren't you satisfied? Why does it have to be Inui-sempai? How many more people have to die?

Kill.

I can't kill him. He knows. Somehow, he can stop me every time.

I caught him trying to poison me, and I passed the poison on to Kaido-sempai. Inui-sempai seems to care about him -- I will get some of my own back.

This poison causes Kaido-sempai to fall apart, literally -- his skin begins to flake, and pieces of his skull are visible before the ambulance that Ryuzaki-sensei calls arrives.

"What the hell is this?" Kaido-sempai asks, terrified.

Inui-sempai pats him on the shoulder. He one of the only people not afraid to touch Kaido-sempai for fear of getting whatever his disease is -- he knows that he can't catch it, because he is the one who created it.

Kill, the voices say.

Kaido-sempai is dying. Why aren't they satisfied?

He kills Fuji-sempai, and I kill Oishi-sempai. When he can't kill me, he kills Tezuka-buchou, though for some reason I think that upsets him, somewhat.

They all die terribly, of a different kind of poison.

Ryuzaki-sensei is in the hospital herself, now. She is suffering from a mental breakdown. All of her tennis players are dying -- there is some strange disease going around.

Only Inui-sempai and I are immune -- at least, we were.

Everyone else is dead, now.

He offers me a cup.

How does he know?

How does he know that everyone has to die, and that there can be only one?

"You're not the only one with voices in your head, Echizen."

Well, that explains it.

"I won't," I say.

It's either him or me, and I think it should be him.

Die, the voices say.

They've changed their message at the end -- well, fine. I guess that dying won't be so bad, if they will finally leave me alone.

I ignore the smile on Inui's face.

I drink from the cup.

Why is it so dark in here?

I feel so tired...


End file.
